Lessons from Eminem Diss Track Against Mariah – “Warning”
I don’t usually do celebrity gossip but this here is what Barack Obama calls a teachable moment so I’m going to make an exception.
First, here’s the backstory:
Eminem has hit out at Mariah Carey and husband Nick Cannon in his new song The Warning.
It’s the latest in a long feud between the pair who first came to blows when Eminem said he had a fling with Mariah back in 2001 and she denied it.
It’s been claimed recently that Mariah mocked the rapper in the video for her latest single Obsession.
It comes after Eminem mentioned Mariah in his song Bagpipes From Baghdad, which also talked about her husband Nick.
In May, Nick leapt to his wife’s defence and retorted by blogging: “homeboy is still obsessed with my wife”.
And here’s the diss track:
I’m torn on this from a power and career perspective. For Eminem, it generates lots of buzz, and the lyrics and beat are sick, yet at the same time, is it good buzz? On one hand this is a whole lot of energy to devote to a chick, especially if the underlying events go back to 2001. And it comes off like catfighting. I’m of the opinion that when dealing with a woman, whether to woo her or in an argument, you should be talking less than she is. Talk more than her and it seems like you’re trying too hard or care too much. But at the same time, he does it with such skill and panache I’m tempted to make an exception, plus he blasts Nick Cannon and his career so well, which is always commendable. I’m sorry but Nick Cannon making the jump from Nickelodeon to entertainment areas requiring street cred always irked me, kind of like if AC Slater suddenly tried to be taken seriously as a member of Terror Squad after Saved by the Bell.
Which leads to the next question: what’s the best way for Nick Cannon to proceed from here? Any way he proceeds from here just makes him look worse. He’s basically become known as the ghetto Ashton Kutcher by making himself the boytoy of an A-list cougar. He’s tried to rap before but he’s not ready for a battle rap against a lyricist of Eminem’s character:
It’s too late pull the dismissive “I’m too big for all that, it’s beneath me” move because he already publicly issued a warning to Eminem in the media. On his twitter page he’s going that route now with quotes like “Quote of the day: “Never argue with fools because from a distance people cant tell who is who” and When there are no enemies within the enemies outside can not hurt you!” and “Never take your own revenge, but rather give place unto the wrath. For it is written vengeance is mine, I will repay… PREACH!” and “”I will bless those that bless you, and whoever curses you I will curse.” Genesis 12:3″ (Even though these are all well-known sayings, they’ve all been used in Jay-Z songs, making his response come off extra unoriginal and weak) He keeps adding a new quote related to taking the higher ground and being the better man every 6 minutes or so, and the tone is becoming increasingly desperate.
Three mistakes here: First mistake, if you’re going to dismiss a beef as being beneath you, you should just dismiss it once firmly and be done with it unless the opponent keeps coming back at you harder and harder. By saying it doesn’t matter over and over and over, Cannon gives the impression that it does matter. If he pulled such a move right after Eminem’s first volley, it would have been the right thing to do. Jay-Z recently did something similar with attention-whore rapper The Game. But Cannon made the mistake of publicly calling Eminem out on the carpet and threatening him, so after he put himself out there like that with such a blatant warning and his bluff has been called, there’s no turning back and playing the high road now. He backed himself into a corner and taking the high road after warning somebody that there’d be hell to pay if they crossed you again just makes him look weak. So his second mistake was, never make a threat unless you know you are willing to carry it out and specifically know HOW you are going to carry it out. Because if the person calls your bluff and you’re caught hesitating and you wait until then to think of how to proceed, you’ve already lost. For Cannon to respond with platitudes like that at this point is like bringing knives to a gunfight. This is a guy who has rapped multiple songs calling his wife a whore and fantasizing about killing her, written songs attacking his mother and has pulled out guns on multiple people. What did you expect to happen when you called him out, and why weren’t you prepared for it?!
To me Nick Cannon’s third and biggest mistake though was marrying a woman like Mariah Carey in the first place. This woman has had a history of hanging out with guys so far out of his league when it comes to griminess and bad boy attitude. After her split with Tommy Mottolla, this woman was utterly immersed in the world of hip-hop and urban entertainment. Any chick who is so heavily involved and embroiled in the rap and urban entertainment world as Mariah Carey was for so many years is bound to have some psycho, thug and gangster bad boy skeletons in her closet. Even if she says she never dated or had sex with any guys in this bad circle, it doesn’t matter, because women often lie to cover up their scandalous pasts, and men often lie to boost their number of conquests, and once you’re caught in the middle of a he-say, she-say situation, you already lose. You never know who to believe because there’s no way to prove anything. Even if she and Eminem disagree on the extent of the fling, they both admit there was some degree of a fling between them. That should be all you need to know when it comes to whether or not to marry her.
A woman’s past is always potentially your problem when you become serious with her, so you have to know what level of conflict you’re built for and if your woman’s social circle is well beyond that level, don’t enter a relationship with her. For example I’m no gangster so any chick I met who had a history of psycho gangster ex-es I avoided for long term commitments, because her past meant a higher likelihood of stalker psycho ex-es in my future, guys with way less to lose than me. If she had tough guys in her past who were the type to maybe just have a single one-on-one fight with me and leave it at that, that was an acceptable risk I knew I could handle. If he was in gangs and into gunplay or was an ex-con, fuck that. In college I knew a lot of guys who messed with chicks with ex-es like that and got a lot of grief as a result.
I was acquainted with a girl who was a lawyer, who had a really horrible bad boy streak up through her 20s. She was the smoking hot chick who loved the high-drama relationships with tattooed asshole psycho thugs and the occasional asshole psycho cop, which is even worse because you have even less recourse against a guy like that. She had the problem later when she hit her late 20s and early 20s. She was getting older and was no closer to settling down or finding stability in her personal life, so she wanted a nice guy provider type to settle down with now that she was done getting pumped and dumped by scumbags. Problem was, a lot of her crazy ex-es, including the psycho cop, were periodically resurfacing to stalk her, show up unannounced and threaten all her new boyfriends, and none of these new nice guy professional guys were willing to put up with it. Every week was a new sob story with this woman that related to her past awful dating choices. The lesson the guys in her life learned is the lesson that Cannon is learning now. That if you’re a square and a woman has a history of traveling in circles with thugs, guidos, gangster or convicts, even if she claims never to have dated one, don’t date her and risk putting yourself in a position you’re not equipped to handle.
So I guess the questions are, does this hurt Eminem more than it helps him or vice versa? Is it some gangsta shit or bad move to kiss and tell to that extent? In general, I think getting a reputation as one who kisses and tells without provacation is one of the worst moves a guy can do, but that then begs the question, was there sufficient provocation by Cannon and Carey? And what should Cannon’s next move be? What should his past moves have been?
(5 votes, average: 3.40 out of 5)
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way to break it down, T, especially the third point re: a woman’s past.
You’ve described three mistakes Nick and Mariah made leading up to this fiasco and I could probably name you a few more, but all of this can be distilled to one: their inability to recognize when they were outgunned and not just walking away.
In any kind of conflict there are differences in the rules of engagement adhered to by each party, differences in the superiority of the weapons available, and differences in size. When you’re in a fight (physical or mental), there usually is some discrepancy in these 3 elements of combat but either side usually has enough of a superiority on at least one element to make both parties think they have a shot of winning. The U.S. went to Vietnam because they thought their superior firepower would overwhelm the VietCong, and the Vietnamese fought back because they thought their more flexible rules of engagement could trip up the Goliath. Either side had valid reasons for thinking they could win…at least in the beginning.
Here, what Nick and Mariah did was worse than bringing a knife to a gunfight. They brought spoons. They were outmatched in every element from the beginning here and any response from them would only serve to corner them and make their situation worse. They should have ignored this.
1. Rules of engagement. As you duly point out, Eminem is a dirty fighter. He’s got a history of viciously roasting ppl so he’s gonna come hard. Nick and Mariah are stymied by the “good boy/good girl” image so they can’t really come out with a profane response that’s needed to respond to this. Point to Eminem.
2. Superiority of Available Weapons. Nick should have known better. He admits it himself that Eminem is better than him on the mic in a retracted blog posting. See it here, http://www.thisis50.com/profil.....-on-eminem
So he wasn’t gonna outrhyme Eminem.
Nick also underhandedly challenged Eminem to a fistfight in that same post, because he’s been “training in boxing and martial arts for years”. I actually believe Nick, that he’d beat Eminem in a fight if it came to that, but again, thats silly since the chances of them actually running into each other and coming to blows are slim. That’s like U.S. threatening Jamaica with nuclear weapons. Jamaica knows the U.S. couldn’t use it, so its effectively off the table.
3. Differences in Size. Nick/Mariah took on an industry heavyweight that has a big fan base and a bully pulpit. Maybe if it was some no-name rapper in Nashville, she could have responded, dissed him, ruined his career and moved on. But Eminem’s fan base will fuel this and make any response from him even more impactful. Already on youtube, his response videos have close to 1 million views after just a couple days out.
They should recognized they were outmatched here and walked away. Most ppl would probably never have heard about Eminem exploits if they hadn’t got into this beef with him. I never heard about this until Eminem’s response.
By the way, although I’m very skeptical about marriage in general, I disagree with you very strongly that Nick shouldn’t have married Mariah, but that’s another post for another day.
-DevX
As long as Cannon is unable to respond in kind, Eminem will benefit from the attention generated by the feud. I don’t know if this qualifies as “gangsta” or not–I have no real knowledge or understanding of the culture; what I do know is that doesn’t matter if you’re a punk if no one’s going to call you on it.
As to whether or not there was sufficient provocation to start the feud, I’d have to say no; never worry about a woman denying that she slept with you–you know that she did, and that’s all that matters. Women lie about sex all the time. You can’t take it personally.
As to Cannon next move, he’s got to gain some kind of leverage over Eminem–something at least as embarrassing as nude pics of Mariah. Cannon can’t out-rap Eminem, so Cannon will have to attack from a different angle–possibly blackmail, assuming he can find enough dirt to shut Eminem up. Once he has the shit, though, deliver the ultimatum and let it all die down. Don’t go looking for payback, and don’t flaunt it in Eminem’s face–let it die down and be forgotten.
As to Cannon’s past mistakes, you highlighted his worst one–marrying Mariah in the first place. Never allow your lust blind you to a woman’s flaws.
You’ve described three mistakes Nick and Mariah made leading up to this fiasco and I could probably name you a few more, but all of this can be distilled to one: their inability to recognize when they were outgunned and not just walking away.
Well said.
Good post.
A couple of thoughts:
Eminem is hilarious. And very hard to defeat. He is crazy and has no shame.
A “crazy” person is hard to defeat. See Ali psyching out the monster Sonny Liston.
Eminem and Mariah will both benefit from this career wise and in record sales.
Nick Cannon will be the loser in this one.
I like Em and the way he gets at people, but he really should go for better targets. There are more annoying people out there than Mariah. (Possibly none more annoying than Cannon though).
Em is necessary in this world. We need him to shake things up.
Tupac also did a great job of that. He is badly missed. For many reasons.
Em no doubt did this for financial reasons. Musicians are not making the cheese they used to.
- MPM
The G Manifesto´s last blog ..Pink Panther Jewel Thieves: Heros of The People
T,
That was a great post. The only question I have is that If Nick Cannon is unable to protect his girl from Em will Mariah find somebody else who can?
If I was Nick Cannon, I’d hire a quality ghostwriter(like Rhymefest) to help craft a song that attacks at Eminem’s soft underbelly(addiction issues, Wife, daughter and Mother issues ect.) Nobody expects Nick Cannon to make a decent response track so the bar is set really low.
Celebrity gossip? You’re joking, right?
Is the author of this piece named Jenny or Katie?
Hehehehehe.
i have’nt heard any recent songs from Em about his addiction issues but in the past Eminem has had no problem about talking about those things in his songs.
drug ballad
kim
cleaning out my closet
like others have said Eminem is crazy and he’s thrown the rules are out the window. a guy who’s raps about his life like he has might as while be crazy.
T,
You will like this article:
Foreign Policy: Jay-Z Schools Us In U.S. Hegemony
http://www.npr.org/templates/s.....=106588112
Pretty good, although there are some factual errors.
- MPM
The G Manifesto´s last blog ..Girls I have Swooped Before
Eminem has lost almost the entirety of his cultural relevance. The only way to gain any amount of media is through lame and trite stunts like this.
And what targets he picked: Nick Cannon and Mariah Carey? Gosh maybe he’ll go after Miley Cyrus next (I’m sure his newest album is rife with references). Not surprising though considering his previous targets were NSYNC, Britney Spears, and Benzino (had to google that last one).
He was done five years ago and his act is stale. We’re not shocked by his whiteness nor his his sadistic imagination (yes kill your wife for the 100th time) anymore.
OneSTDV´s last blog ..Is Belief in Racial IQ Differences Racist?
yall crazy to think eminems stale now. hes been limited in the past few years. and if you reference his other beefs at least give him the justice to realize he didnt start none of them.
chris kurtpatrick(from N*sync) out right said em a wuss
benzino called em out as a joke, AND the threatened em with his own magazine.
britney was never a target, just fun to make fun of….seriously who didnt? i recall radio stations makin songs like “boobies-boobies” before em ever said a word
i believe you confused britney for christina aguilera, who said em didnt have a chance on TRL when it was still around
seriously i dont think i’ve ever witness em actaully starting beefs but simply responding to them. yes he does it for publicity but do you remember the Jay z/Nas albums? when they beefed? some good stuff there.
There’s a list of Eminem beefs and how they started here:
http://www.eminemlab.com/eminemenemies.html
It’s not comprehensive but it has most of the major ones. But it does verify what Ski says, that most of the time other people start the beefs first.
The name Benzino may not mean much to people who don’t know hip-hop, but the guy was by no means an easy or small target. He was the owner of the top hip-hop magazine, often called the “bible of hip-hop,” the Source. It’s become a joke since then but at one time it could make or break hip-hop careers with it’s coverage and reviews, and even big artists would kiss the magazine’s ass.
Eminem’s problem isn’t that he picks easy targets, it’s that he doesn’t discriminate against ANY targets, whether it’s a gangster rapper at the peak of his career like Ja Rule or it’s a puppet like Triumph the Insult Comic Dog. He refuses to let any direspect slide regardless of who it comes from. Which can be both a good thing and a bad thing.
“Eminem’s problem isn’t that he picks easy targets, it’s that he doesn’t discriminate against ANY targets”
Good point.
Also, as an aside, keep in mind Cage was a beast when he and Em locked horns (Em did kind of bite from early Cage) and had little to gain at the time.
Everlast was another battle tested MC (who had battled with DJ Quik in the past) that he went toe to toe with.
I am glad that Em destroyed those limp biscuit queers.
Thank goodness they are wiped off the map.
We can all thank Em for that one.
- MPM
The G Manifesto´s last blog ..Girls I have Swooped Before
There’s a list of Eminem beefs and how they started here:
He has been busy, hasn’t he?
Nick Cannon is a joke. Always has been a joke. He needs to go and hide underneath a rock to save the little shred of respect/dignity he still might have left. He’s beyond wack. Ugh!
Eminem’s going to such great lengths to diss Mariah only makes him a beeyotch. I thought rappers beefed with other rappers as a means of proving their street cred? Who the hell is Mariah Carey to be beefing with?
All three of them should screw each other and then they’d be even. Next, please.
The Sphinx´s last blog ..Men: Investments vs. Liabilities
Mariah is a fantastic singer but I like the older songs better especially The Rain.